1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a card holder.
2. Description of the Prior Art
As is widely known, IC cards provide a large storage capacity and a high degree of security, and, for this reason, IC cards have in recent years attracted much attention as a new information storage medium to replace conventional magnetic cards. In fact, IC cards have been finding more and more applications lately. For example, IC cards are used as premium point cards to record premium points that are given to a card bearer in accordance with the amount of his or her purchase and are exchangeable with goods or services in accordance with the number of accumulated points, or as rental cards to record information related to rented CDs, videocassettes, or other, or as prepaid cards.
However, to see the information recorded in an IC card, a set of specialized equipment including a card reader and a display device is required, and, in general, a card bearer does not own such equipment, much less carries it around for his or her shopping. Accordingly, a card bearer usually cannot readily see the information recorded in an IC card, and this has been causing various inconveniences. For example, in the case of a premium point card, which is first and foremost intended to motivate the card bearer to buy more, the card does not serve the purpose unless the card bearer can readily recognize how many premium points have been accumulated.
To overcome such inconveniences, a type of IC card has been proposed whose surface is provided with a display portion that allows repeated writing and erasing of information through application of heat or a magnetic field. This type of IC card allows the data recorded therein to be displayed on the display portion, and thus allows the card bearer to see the information recorded in the card with ease. However, it is difficult to provide such a display portion for some types of card such as credit cards in which a membership number or other information is embossed on the surface.